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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24755560">Talons</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ethuilriel/pseuds/Ethuilriel'>Ethuilriel</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>After the End of the World [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Arcana (Visual Novel)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>AFAB Apprentice (The Arcana), Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Body Dysmorphia, Eventual Smut, Explicit rating as of Ch. 5, F/M, Gender-Neutral Apprentice (The Arcana), Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Julian Devorak Route - Reversed Ending, M/M, Monsterfucking, Other, care and keeping of your beautiful bird boy, there will be monsterfucking in later chapters but we gotta take care of the bird boy first</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 05:53:31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>15,433</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24755560</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ethuilriel/pseuds/Ethuilriel</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“Julian, could I...neaten up your-your feathers, a bit?”</p><p>He makes a choking sound that’s almost a laugh.</p><p>“Huh, I am something of a mess, aren’t I? I seem to have neglected my-my usual urbane exterior, my dashing good looks, my-my...” He lets his words trail off.</p><p>You take a cloth and dip it in the bucket of water, slowly bringing it to wipe at something on his shoulder that might be dried blood. Julian was stoic when you pulled broken glass from between his toes, but he flinches away at this gentle touch. You pull your hand away quickly.</p><p>“Are you alright? Am I hurting you?” you ask.</p><p>His face reddens under his black feathered cheeks. “No, no...it’s just...No, you’re not hurting me.”</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Apprentice/Julian Devorak, Julian Devorak/Reader, Julian Devorak/You</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>After the End of the World [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1854073</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>85</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>445</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. After the end of the world</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>The sex scenes (I don't consider this a spoiler because you already know it's rated Explicit) are in Chapter 5 and Chapter 6. If you want pure smut (and hey, that's entirely fair! I absolutely don't judge), I think they function well enough as standalones, as long as you're familiar with Julian's reversed ending. If you don't want to read sex scenes skip Chapter 5 and skip the second half of Chapter 6 (there are no critical plot elements in that chapter once the sex starts).</p><p>These are also the only chapters that mention AFAB anatomy (no gendered pronouns are used throughout).</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Julian blinks and squints. He casts a longing look at the door you’ve just exited.</p><p>“Julian.” You take his hand. “Let’s go.”</p><p>In the cramped interior of the Hanged Raven, he’d been a large, hulking shadow. Menacing, even. Here, in the dull gray light of the mangrove swamp, slouching into himself, he looks smaller. He shivers slightly.</p><p>“Please,” you say. If you see him walk back through that door your heart will break. “Please. I want us to go.”</p><p>He looks at you and grips your hand back. His smile is weak but determined. “Then I’ll go. I’ll do anything for you. I won’t leave you again. I promise. I love you.”</p><p>“I love you too, Julian.”</p><p>He lets you lead him away, picking a careful path behind Scout through the swamp. You’re gripping his hand tightly, pulling him along behind you, afraid if you linger you’ll lose him. So you’re not sure how long you’ve been walking when you look over your shoulder and notice he’s limping.</p><p>“Scout, wait for a minute,” you call.</p><p>He’s grimacing when you turn to get a proper look at him. “What’s wrong?”</p><p>“Oh, nothing much...I..aha, I guess I didn’t notice before...before...”</p><p>He glances down at his feet and you gasp as you notice the mess of bloody cuts. You remember the crunch of broken glass under your boots at the Hanged Raven.</p><p>“Oh, Julian you should have told me—you’re hurt, and we’ve walked so far...”</p><p>“I-I really didn’t notice it...It’s nothing...nothing at all...”</p><p>“Here, let me take a look.”</p><p>As you take his hands and guide him to sit on a mangrove root, you notice other things. His feathers are dirty, matted in places, broken in others. Cuts and scratches at various stages of healing mar his skin. He seems to notice your appraising look. He smiles grimly.</p><p>“Like what you see? I won’t hold it against you if you’ve changed your mind, out here in the cold light of day. Not too late for me to head back to the Raven.”</p><p>You sigh, slinging your pack off your shoulders and digging for your medical supplies. “Don’t even joke about that.”</p><p>“I’m serious as the plague, my dear. Leaving me to my fate would be the wisest choice you could make.”</p><p>“I’ve told you already. I’m not leaving you. Let me take a look at your feet. Please?”</p><p>He winces when you reach for his foot, but meekly lifts it for your inspection. You barely stifle a gasp at the glitter of broken glass.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” Julian mutters, looking resolutely at the ground. “I-I truly didn’t notice. It was only after we left, that my feet began to hurt...”</p><p>“It’s okay. You don’t have to explain.”</p><p>“Thank you,” he says quietly.</p><p>Slowly, slowly, you clean his wounds. The ones on his feet are the worst, but he’s torn out feathers, scratched himself....</p><p>You bandage him as well as you can, but he’s in no condition for a journey.</p><p>“Scout?”</p><p>Your guide has been waiting up ahead on the path. She turns at her name.</p><p>“I know I told you we wanted to go find our friends—our family, but...is there someplace safe we could rest a while? Somplace not too far?”</p><p>Scout looks thoughtful for a moment, then nods. She continues leading you on the path through the mangrove swamp, Julian leaning on you. Eventually, the ground flattens and dries out, and you’re on a path through a woodland, then a road, and then you see a building. A little inn, a waystation for travelers. No one answers the door or replies to your shouts.</p><p>You hesitate a moment in the doorway, but windows make the tavern common room much brighter than the Hanged Raven, and there’s no sign of shattered mirrors or bewitched accordions. It looks long abandoned, and your quick investigation reveals no other inhabitants, friend or foe.</p><p>“Quite a charming little place we have here, isn’t it?” Julian says, his voice tight with pain. He groans as you help him lower himself onto a bench.</p><p>“I’ll be right back,” you assure him. “I saw a well outside. I’m just going to fetch some water.”</p><p>There’s a bucket by the door, and the water from the well is clear and cool. Julian lets you examine his feet, cleaning and rebandaging where needed.</p><p>“Superb doctoring, my dear. You must have had an exceptional teacher.”</p><p>The bravado in his voice is forced. You rise from the floor to sit beside him on the bench. His injuries are taken care of for now, but he still looks haggard.</p><p>“Julian, could I...neaten up your-your feathers, a bit?”</p><p>He makes a choking sound that’s almost a laugh.</p><p>“Huh, I am something of a mess, aren’t I? I seem to have neglected my-my usual urbane exterior, my dashing good looks, my-my...” He lets his words trail off.</p><p>You take a cloth and dip it in the bucket of water, slowly bringing it to wipe at something on his shoulder that might be dried blood. Julian was stoic when you pulled broken glass from between his toes, but he flinches away at this gentle touch. You pull your hand away quickly.</p><p>“Are you alright? Am I hurting you?” you ask.</p><p>His face reddens under his black feathered cheeks. “No, no...it’s just...No, you’re not hurting me.”</p><p>“I don’t want to do anything that makes you uncomfortable. Is it alright with you if I clean you up a little?”</p><p>“I, ah, you, huh, you don’t have to-to...”</p><p>“May I? Would you let me?”</p><p>He nods, not meeting your eyes. You wash and preen his feathers and gently clean the skin of his arms and chest.</p><p>“You have to stop ripping these feathers out, love,” you admonish quietly as you wipe away dried blood.</p><p>“I, ah, I suppose there’s no avoiding them anymore, is there?”</p><p>He tenses when you reach his legs, and you carefully avoid the space between them.</p><p>When you’ve finished grooming him, his feathers lie flat and smooth, with an iridescent sheen. You find you’re smiling.</p><p>“You look so handsome,” you say.</p><p>“Hah, don’t flatter me. I can take the truth.”</p><p>“I think you look beautiful.”</p><p>You reach out to stroke the feathers of his neck. He closes his eyes and leans slightly in to your touch, his expression one of pain.</p><p>“Thank you,” he says quietly.</p><p>“You’re welcome.” After a moment you say, “How long has it been since you slept? There are bedrooms upstairs.”</p><p>“I, hm, a bed. What a concept. Can’t remember the last time I saw one of those.”</p><p>You rise from your seat beside him and offer your hand. “Come upstairs with me? I’ll keep watch while you sleep.”</p><p>His face melts into anguish.</p><p>“What? What’s wrong?” you ask.</p><p>“I...you’re....you’re too good to me.”</p><p>“I’m exactly as good to you as I want to be.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. I'll do anything for you</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>What have you made him do? You have convinced him to leave something like relative safety, for... for what? What will you find? What hope do you even have?</p><p>Oh, Julian. Julian, Julian Julian. You want to shake him, to shout at him, “Have a little sense of self-preservation!” But shaking and shouting are too rough for him; you want to cradle his head in your lap and hold him and protect him from the world.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <i>“Then I’ll go. I’ll do anything for you. I won’t leave you again. I promise. I love you.” </i>
</p><p>Julian’s words crowd your mind as you watch him sleep.</p><p>
  <i>I’ll do anything for you.</i>
</p><p>His long eyelashes flutter lightly against his pale cheekbones, his face contorting into a frown. Black feathers ruffle; he shifts and makes a small noise that’s almost a whimper. You can only guess at what kind of nightmares might haunt him now. You want to go to him, to comfort him, but you are keeping watch while he takes what rest he can and you won’t risk waking him. You will both need your strength for the coming journey.</p><p>
  <i>I’ll do anything for you.</i>
</p><p>What have you made him do? You have convinced him to leave something like relative safety, for... for what? What will you find? What hope do you even have? You spoke with such surety. <i>“We can still try to make the best of what we have. Come with me, Julian. Let’s find our family.”</i> What right did you have to say that, to offer him something as dangerous as hope? If you’re honest with yourself, you would have said anything to lure him from that...that place. The Hanged Raven? Anything you find will surely be better than that...that...than that. Won’t it? Will it?</p><p>
  <i>I’ll do anything for you.</i>
</p><p>Oh, Julian. Julian, Julian Julian. You want to shake him, to shout at him, “Have a little sense of self-preservation!” But shaking and shouting are too rough for him; you want to cradle his head in your lap and hold him and protect him from the world.</p><p>He whimpers again, louder this time. His head rocks back and forth, brow furrowed. Then the whimpers break into ragged words. “No, no, no, please, please, please no!”</p><p>Quickly, you’re reaching for his feathered arm, shaking him gently but urgently—</p><p>“Julian. Julian, Julian, it’s alright, it’s alright, you’re safe, it’s me, you’re alright...”</p><p>His eyes flutter open, his expression fearful and confused, eyes darting back and forth before they slowly focus on her face.</p><p>“It’s.... It’s really you?”</p><p>“Yes, yes, it’s really me.” You reach out tentatively, barely caressing his cheek, then sliding your hand down to grasp his lightly. “I’m here. You’re safe.”</p><p>You wince internally at your own lie. Neither of you are safe. You will never be safe.</p><p>Gradually, he grips your hand back.</p><p>“You’re...you’re really here? That...What happened at The Hanged Raven? You were there, and...and you...you...and we left, together...that was real?”</p><p>You nod, a little too emphatically. “Yes. I found you, and we left, with Scout, and she’s going to take us to find Portia and Mazelinka and Nadia and Asra. We’ve been traveling through.... Well, I don’t know where, but we’ve been traveling, and we're resting here, and I was keeping watch while you slept, and...and nothing bad’s happened so far. You were asleep, just now.” <i>Nothing bad’s happened so far.</i> So far.</p><p>He cautiously raises his hand—the one that’s not gripping yours like a frantic lifeline—toward your face. And his other hand is gripping yours a little too tightly, sharp talons digging into your skin—</p><p>“Ow!” You try to pull away, and it’s a moment before he realizes what’s happening and releases you.</p><p>His mouth opens and closes helplessly, a doomed fish gasping in the air, and the confusion on his face deepens to despair.</p><p>“Oh, my dear, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I— Did I hurt you? Oh, I’m so sorry...”</p><p>His face is a picture of anguish. You flex your hand, thin lines of blood blooming on the skin. “No, no, I’m fine. I’m fine.”</p><p>“I’m so sorry, I—“</p><p>“I’m fine.” There is anger in your voice, anger at his weakness, though you didn’t intend it and immediately regret it.</p><p>
  <i>I’ll do anything for you.</i>
</p><p>What have asked of him? You don’t deserve him, don’t deserve his devotion.</p><p>“Did I hurt you?” he asks softly, his face so worried, so open, so vulnerable, you want to weep.</p><p>“No, no, nothing like that. Just a little...scratch.” You force a smile. Your hand is fine. <i>You’re</i> fine—well, you need him to believe that.</p><p>You knew each other for only a few weeks before...all this... (the few weeks you remember, you remind yourself; you knew each other for...how long? before...before you died....) In that time, Julian was the one who put on a dashing, devil-may-care demeanor. You had pushed him to reveal his fear, his doubt, his vulnerability... You had thought you were doing something noble, something right, but now you see how his debonair façade was a way of insulating you both from the dangerous reality of your situation. It was a survival strategy. Now...now he is so raw, so soft, so exposed... Now it is your turn to protect him.</p><p>“I’ve certainly had worse than a little scratch,” you say with what you hope is a wry smile. You lean forward and kiss his floundering lips. He kisses you back, but weakly, barely, and oh, you think of the desperate hunger of his mouth in that starstrand-lit garden, in Mazelinka’s cottage, the library, the Coliseum dungeon the palace bath the Tower...</p><p>You pull away with a sob.</p><p>Julian sits up. “What’s wrong? What’s wrong, my love?”</p><p>And oh, it’s that, that’s it. “My love.” Your pathetic attempt at strength, at stoicism... You’re crying, weeping... you wrap your arms around him, press your face to his chest. He wraps his arms around you, then, remembering his talons on your hand, dislodges them, grasping only at air.</p><p>“Darling? Love?”</p><p>You sob harder.</p><p>“I-I...” You try to speak. “I love you so much.”</p><p>“And I love you.”</p><p>But that’s not enough, is it? Your love won’t protect you from the monsters, the dangers, the obstacles of this strange new world.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” you mutter against his chest.</p><p>“Sorry? For what? What on earth do you have to apologize for?” He strokes your hair with a knuckle.</p><p>“For taking you— For making you leave. For luring you away.”</p><p>“Leave? Leave that place? The-The Hanged Raven? Oh, oh, my love... Never apologize for... Never apologize for taking me from that place. You gave me hope. You gave me hope for the first time in.... a long time. Wherever we go, whatever we do, it will be better than that. I was... I had given up. I had given up on anything and everything. You, my love... We’ll face this world together. Oh, my darling...”</p><p>He is still stroking your hair, his knuckles gently dragging against your scalp.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” is all you can say.</p><p>“Shhhhh.”</p><p><i>I’m sorry,</i> you think.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Weakness</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>You will not allow him his punishment. He could free you from him: he could leave this place now, while you are asleep. He wishes he were strong enough to do this; he stays. He tells himself he is protecting you; he tells himself he is a monster strong enough to keep you safe from other monsters; he knows in his heart he stays because he is greedy and weak and longs for you to press your soft cheek again to his breast.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Warnings for self-hatred, body hatred (Julian hates his bird-demon body), and brief mention of self-harm</p><p>This one's real angsty, folks, but I promise it's going to get happier in future chapters.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>You have finally fallen asleep. You had kept watch over Julian while he slept, drawing him back into the waking world when nightmares threatened to consume his sanity, and now it is his turn to do the same for you. He sits on the floor, his frame too big for the small stool in the inn’s bedroom, unwilling to share the bed with you (his eyes avoid the lurid red lines where he drew blood from your hand), and afraid that if he lets you out of his sight you will disappear—or that he will forget you.</p><p>His feet throb. He’d paced endlessly over broken glass in the dim light of the Hanged Raven and never felt its bite; he’d torn out his own feathers with talons and teeth and been numb to it all. Only once he left, only once he felt your soft hand pulling his scaled claw forward out the door and through the mangrove swamp and beyond; only then had his wounds begun to hurt him. Now, carefully cleaned and lovingly bandaged, his whole body hurts.</p><p>
  <i>Never apologize for taking me from that place. You gave me hope. You gave me hope for the first time in.... a long time. Wherever we go, whatever we do, it will be better than that.</i>
</p><p>His voice had been so steady in his reassurance as you wept against his chest, as he—carefully, carefully, talon terrifyingly close to your scalp—stroked your hair with a single scaled knuckle. He had felt like the sound of your sobs would break him (that is ridiculous; he is already broken), and he had no way to comfort you except with his words. You are so small and soft in comparison to him—oh, he knows how strong you are, but no human body is meant to be caressed by that of a demon, a body of scale and leather and horn, all the hard pieces of natural animals put together wrong. His new body, his terrible body, this body, has no soft secret places where a lover might pillow their head.</p><p>Yet still you had insisted on clinging to him, even after his casual touch had drawn your blood. Even after you’d had to bathe off the filth his carelessness had left on his own body. <i>“You have to stop ripping these feathers out, love,”</i> you’d said so sweetly, so lightly, like you were combing brambles from a child’s hair, not cleaning the self-inflicted wounds of a half-mad beast.</p><p>He’d never believed he was a <i>good</i> man. Even in his human days, there were crimes he’d never atoned for: desperate acts from his wandering youth, dark deeds in the plague dungeon beneath the palace...but he’d always had a capacity for gentleness. Whatever sins his human hands had committed, they’d also set broken bones, cooled the fevered foreheads of the sick, clasped in fellowship the hands of friends, made music from the strings of a vielle, brought pleasure to the body of a lover. His leathery-hard, scaled-and-taloned hands are made for none of these things.</p><p>And perhaps, perhaps he could learn to live in this body, if he didn’t know how it had come to be. The hideous fact of his body pales in comparison to the hideous reason he has become this way. For it was his sacrifice, his bargain, that sealed the fate of the world. If he had been stronger, braver, cleverer, better, maybe the Devil would not have won. It is fitting, then, that his twisted, Devil-bound soul now has a body to match.</p><p>But you. You will not allow him his punishment. Vulnerable and trusting, you slumber near enough that he hears you breathe, the light through the window shining on your hair. He could free you from him: he could leave this place now, while you are asleep. He wishes he were strong enough to do this; he stays. He tells himself he is protecting you; he tells himself he is a monster strong enough to keep you safe from other monsters; he knows in his heart he stays because he is greedy and weak and longs for you to press your soft cheek again to his breast.</p><p>As if thinking of you is enough to wake you, he hears the rustle of cloth as you stir in the bed. You make a sleepy noise in your throat.</p><p>“Mm, good morning, Julian.”</p><p>He smiles in spite of himself. “I’m not sure it’s morning, darling.” <i>Darling.</i> He has no right to call you that but the word slips out anyway. “Er, to tell you the truth, I’m not sure if it’s ever morning here.”</p><p>“Well then we can decide it’s morning right now.” You sit up, stretch, pat the mattress beside you. “Come sit with me. I want to see how nice your feathers look after all my grooming.”</p><p>Too weak to deny your request, he unfolds himself from the floor and gingerly places himself beside you on the bed. You kneel for a better angle, deftly working your fingers through the plumes of his head and shoulders until they lie smooth.</p><p>“So pretty,” you murmur offhandedly. “And you’ll look even nicer when these broken ones molt and grow back in.”</p><p>Julian feels his feathers fluff involuntarily at the praise. He doesn’t deserve you—<i>you</i> don’t deserve to share <i>his</i> punishment—and yet here you are, touching him softly, taking for granted that you’ll be together long enough to see his body change and that you’ll enjoy the sight.</p><p>“You ah, you suppose I’ll molt? Like a chicken?”</p><p>“You haven’t yet? Well, it would’ve been hard to tell with you ripping them out all the time.”</p><p>His plumage lies neatly now; your continued caresses are purely for pleasure, not function, and he closes his eyes, guiltily enjoying your touch. When you press your mouth to his, he lets your tongue part his lips, then pulls away as a thought occurs to him belatedly.</p><p>“My teeth,” he croaks. “They’re too sharp now....”</p><p>“I’ll be careful.” He hears, rather than sees, your smile against his neck, before you lean up to take his mouth in yours again.</p><p>Gently, slowly, you press him backward so he’s lying on the bed, crawling onto his lap to straddle him, hips pressing against him, his mouth still captured in yours. Oh, oh, this is too good...a moan escapes from deep in his throat, and your mouth moves from his jaw to his neck as your hips rock against him...pleasure is pooling low in his stomach...</p><p>And oh, then you whisper against the hollow of his collarbone, “Tell me how you want to be touched.”</p><p>He’s frozen, trapped between desire and guilt. He can’t speak. He’s a monster. He can’t let you...part of him hopes you will but...</p><p>There is silence. For too long. You sit up.</p><p>“Julian? What’s wrong?”</p><p>He doesn’t meet your eyes.</p><p>“We-we shouldn’t.”</p><p>You swing your leg off him, lie beside him on the bed, propped up on an elbow.</p><p>“Why not?" you ask gently. "And shouldn’t, or you don’t want to? Because if you don’t want to, that’s fine, but that’s not what you said.”</p><p>“I’m a monster,” he says hoarsely. “It’s wrong. It’s unnatural. And I could hurt you—I already did hurt you, just holding your hand—what might I do if...if we...”</p><p>You run the back of your fingers slowly up and down his arm and say, “You didn’t answer my question. Do you want to? Because I want to, and if you do too, then I think we should. We’ll be careful.”</p><p>He shakes his head, rolls on his side so his back is to you. “We can’t be careful enough. And in any case it’s <i>wrong</i>, it’s unnatural, it’s disgusting, it’s...it’s...”</p><p>“You’re none of those things. You’re my Julian.” And you keep touching him, running a hand down the feathers of his back, between in his wings, so gently, so soft, too sweet a touch for this broken twisted body of his.</p><p>“Of course,” you say slowly, “I’m not going to do anything that you don’t want—that you don’t tell me <i>very clearly</i> that you want—but I’m telling you I want you very much, still, just as much as I ever did.”</p><p>He feels desire gathering between his hips at those words, and his muscles tense, as though he can hold it back, hold it off, because he can’t, he can’t let you know, he can’t give in to the pit of greediness inside him, the hollow <i>need</i> for you, the need for your touch, your too-soft touch on his ugly violent ruin of a body. Your hand keeps stroking his back, and he is too weak to move away.</p><p>“Julian? Talk to me? Will you tell me what you’re thinking?”</p><p>“Perhaps-perhaps I can accept that you wish to stay with me, that you persist in loving me, but this is too far. I-I cannot—<i>will</i> not—allow you to dirty yourself, to despoil yourself, by-by lying with me. This body is not meant for love.”</p><p>He hears you sigh. “None of that is true. You’re still Julian, who I love and want a great deal. But I’m not going to push you, so please relax. You’re trembling. I’m just going to keep rubbing your back, like this, and that’s all, unless you want me to stop that too.”</p><p>“No,” he says, voice small, “please don’t stop.”</p><p>It’s weakness, he knows, to let you touch him at all, but then he has always been weak.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Delicate Touch</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>
  <i>Do you know what it’s like to look in a mirror and not know who’s looking back?</i>
</p><p>There are no mirrors here, only your repeated assurance that he’s beautiful and that you want him. He’s always been beautiful to you, but with your care his body begins to look less haggard. Cuts heal; the hollows of his cheeks and between his ribs fill out. When he’s forced to let his feathers grow in, and when they’re kept neat and clean, he begins to look truly spectacular. His plumage ripples like water or fine silk when he shakes or shrugs, iridescent shades of violet and blue-green jumping in the light.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It breaks your heart, how meekly obedient he is now. Once, Julian loved mischief and trouble, wanted adventure, wanted <i>you</i>. This Julian seems to want nothing at all.</p><p>He’ll do what you say, though, and you use this to your advantage. First of all, he’s not allowed to argue with you when you tell him he’s handsome and that you love and want him. You make it clear you don’t expect anything from him when you say this: you’re not saying it to make him feel guilty or push him to do anything. He doesn’t have to believe you, but he’s not allowed to argue.</p><p>Secondly, he’s not allowed to pull out his feathers or scratch at his skin with his sharp talons. You offer to trim his talons, but he insists he needs them to defend you, even though you’ve seen nothing and no one except for the occasional visit from Scout. You suspect the truth is that if his claws were less sharp, he’d have one fewer excuse not to touch you. Broken feathers fall out and are replaced, and new ones come in at the bloody bald patches. When the new feathers itch, you convince him to let you scratch his tough skin lightly with your harmless human fingernails. You preen him, making his feathers lie flat and telling him how nice they look.</p><p>Finally, you set a rhythm for your life at the inn, and he participates without complaint, if also without enthusiasm.</p><p>There are days and nights here, but no sunrise or sunset, only dim gray light like an overcast winter sky. You punctuate your time with sleep and meals.</p><p>There are two bedrooms upstairs, and you drag the mattress from one into the other so you can sleep beside each other, with enough space between you so that Julian doesn’t fear hurting you. You wake him from nightmares and remind him he is safe.</p><p>There is a cellar where you find flour, onions, potatoes, and winter squash. You suspect you might not need to eat here, or not often, but it is something human, something normal, something <i>nice</i>, so you insist Julian sit with you for meals of onion soup and bread. He is subdued, directionless, but complies when you ask him to stir the soup while you knead the bread dough, ask him to help you carry firewood or fetch potatoes from the cellar.</p><p>As his feet begin to heal, you start venturing into the surrounding forest, making longer and longer trips to gather mushrooms and herbs. You ask that he come with you to protect you. In truth, you doubt you need his protection—you have your own magic and your long knife. What you really want is to make sure this inn doesn’t become your new Hanged Raven, to remind yourselves there is a world beyond. You check his cuts daily, ask him how walking feels, talk about your plans for the future.</p><p>Often, words he said to you at the Hanged Raven spring unbidden into your mind.</p><p>
  <i>Do you know how many pieces of yourself you can lose, before you aren’t you anymore?</i>
</p><p>You’re not sure what to do to help him find pieces of himself. You feel like you’ve lost pieces of yourself, too. Your love, having each other, is a piece, a piece you’re working to reclaim.</p><p>
  <i>Do you know what it’s like to look in a mirror and not know who’s looking back?</i>
</p><p>There are no mirrors here, only your repeated assurance that he’s beautiful and that you want him. He’s always been beautiful to you, but with your care his body begins to look less haggard. Cuts heal; the hollows of his cheeks and between his ribs fill out. When he’s forced to let his feathers grow in, and when they’re kept neat and clean, he begins to look truly spectacular. His plumage ripples like water or fine silk when he shakes or shrugs, iridescent shades of violet and blue-green jumping in the light. </p><p>You touch Julian as much as you can, the little touches he allows: a squeeze of his hand, a stroke of your fingers through his feathers, a kiss brushed lightly against his cheek. At the beginning, he flinched from your touches, but gradually he permits more contact. You’re glad for several reasons: touching each other is a piece of yourselves you’re eager to reclaim, but also, selfishly, it’s a struggle to keep your hands off him. Of course you heed his hesitancy, careful not to push him past his comfort, but oh, your heart leaps when he leans, ever so slightly, into your hand on his shoulder, when a smile ghosts across his face as you stroke his cheek, when he closes his eyes and his feathers lift with pleasure as you preen him. When he takes your hand you want to weep.</p><p>You accept these small touches as the limits of your affection, for a while. The memory of him frozen, silent, trapped on the bed beneath you springs back into your mind often and fills you with shame. It hurts you that he thinks he doesn’t deserve your physical love, but you’re not sure what to do about it. You suspect he still wants you—when you asked him that night, he never denied it—but you’re afraid to bring it up again. You begin to worry that maybe, maybe it’s not just his shame or discomfort with his new body; maybe he really doesn’t want you anymore.</p><p>The thought gnaws at your mind, growing, growing, until you have to do something about it or it will consume you.</p><p>You plan your moment: you will talk while you are on a walk to gather herbs in the forest, so you will have something to do, so that you will not feel so trapped in the small building.</p><p>“Julian,” you say, your voice shaky. You fiddle with your small knife. You take a deep breath, then speak quickly. “Julian do you still want me? To-to lie with me? Because I know so many things have changed, and I- it’s alright if you don’t. Really it is. I-I do still want you, in that way, a great deal in fact—but that’s beside the point. If you don’t have those feelings anymore, it’s really alright. It is.”</p><p>He says nothing and you can’t meet his eyes. You’re near a willow tree, and though you have plenty already, you grab a handful of branches and start to hack at them with your knife.</p><p>“I understand,” you continue nervously. “Things have changed, so if—“</p><p>“Oh, my dear, my dearest. It’s not that, it’s not...I-I love you. I love you, but I’m <i>wrong</i>, I’m demonic, I’m an abomination...It wouldn’t be right....”</p><p>“That’s not what I asked. Please respect me enough to tell me the truth—I’m begging you to tell me the truth, whatever it is.” You chop ruthlessly at your handful of willow sprigs. “Do-do you still want me?”</p><p>“Yes.” His voice is low. “I do. I do still want you. But we can’t do anything about it. It would be wrong.”</p><p>You turn to face him. “Why? Why would it be so wrong? We’ve lain together before, plenty of times. You look different now but you’re still <i>you</i>.”</p><p>He snorts. “In case you haven’t noticed, I have <i>talons</i>.  I don’t fully know this body’s strength, but it’s certainly beyond that of a human. I’m dangerous. If I hurt you I would never forgive myself. It simply isn’t safe for you.”</p><p>Shoving the handful of willow branches into your bag, you step toward him. You take his hand, and he lets you. “Julian, you were the most careful and gentle and thoughtful lover I’ve ever been with. I don’t think you’ll hurt me. We can find ways to work around anything you’re worried about. Let me trim your talons, to start?”</p><p>Despair and hope fight in his eyes. He shakes his head. “I-I...I’m <i>hideous</i>...how could anyone....”</p><p>“I think you’re beautiful. I want you very much. And, unless you plan on watching yourself in a mirror the whole time, my opinion on your appearance is the one that matters here.”</p><p>He smiles at this, though pain is still apparent in his eyes.</p><p>“Look,” you sigh, staring down at his hand in your own, “If you really don’t want to, we won’t. I only want to do what you also want to do. But if we both want each other, if we both want to...to bring pleasure to each other, I don’t see any good reason why we shouldn’t.”</p><p>You drop his hand and continue down the path. Over your shoulder you say, “We don’t need to talk about this anymore now, but I’m not just going to give up.”</p><p>“Alright.” It’s so quiet you think you might have imagined it. But then he swallows, and, again, louder, “Alright. Let’s try.”</p><p>You turn to look at him. His face is red.</p><p>“Really?” you ask cautiously.</p><p>“Yes. Really. Let’s-let’s try. Although, we need to take some...precautions. Trimming these”—he flexes his talons—“is a good place to start, but I sincerely worry about hurting you. I-I lack confidence in my capacity for er, <i>delicate</i> touching...”</p><p>“Well then I’ll have to do the touching for both of us,” you say. You step toward him, reach out and slowly run your fingernails down his chest, eliciting a shiver. He swallows, face even redder. You lean up to whisper in his ear, “But I might be distinctly <i>in</i>delicate.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Back to Life</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>You lean over him and kiss him, at last without reservation. He is being cautious, you can tell, hesitant to move his sharp-toothed mouth against yours. You want to tell him, <i>I’m not made of glass</i>,  but you know that to him, you might as well be. He is very worried about hurting you—perhaps with cause, perhaps not, but debating the reality of the danger is irrelevant compared to assuaging his worries.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>We've gotten to the sex part. NSFW. Monsterfucking.</p><p>No gendered pronouns are used but the anatomy of the apprentice is AFAB.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>You find yourself suddenly, unusually shy as you undress, turning your back to him to do so. How long has it been since he’s seen you unclothed? Will he still like what he sees? When you glance over your shoulder at him, he is watching you intently, worrying his lower lip with his sharp teeth, eyes heavy-lidded with longing. He looks away quickly when you catch his eye.</p><p>“I want you to watch me,” you say, turning toward him. You slowly lower your underclothes. “It makes me feel good when you watch me.”</p><p>His face reddens. Naked now, you kneel beside him on the mattress. At his request (in his excess of caution) you have tied his wrists to the headboard of the bed. You stare at each other silently for a moment.</p><p>“Everything feel ok? Your arms I mean?”</p><p>“Quite alright.”</p><p>“You’ll tell me if anything doesn’t feel good, or if you want to stop?” you ask, for at least the fifth time.</p><p>“I will. And...and you’ll do the same?”</p><p>“Of course.”</p><p>You lean over him and kiss him, at last without reservation. He is being cautious, you can tell, hesitant to move his sharp-toothed mouth against yours. You want to tell him, <i>I’m not made of glass</i>,  but you know that to him, you might as well be. He is very worried about hurting you—perhaps with cause, perhaps not, but debating the reality of the danger is irrelevant compared to assuaging his worries.</p><p>You’ve discussed this extensively. That first evening, when he’d agreed to try? Oh, you wanted to throw yourself at him, press your bodies together without thought, fueled by lust. But it was never an option: he wasn’t ready. He needed to talk about your plans first, needed to think it all through, needed to know what you’d do if he somehow hurt you. You’d meant it when you said he was the gentlest, most careful, most thoughtful lover you’d known, so you sincerely doubted his worried worst-case-scenarios would every come to pass. Their likelihood was not the question, though: the question was how to make him comfortable.</p><p>You agreed on this: he will lie back, hands tied, while you touch him, and yourself. His talons (even dulled as they are, now that he’s let you trim them) will never approach your skin. You have told him (sternly), many times: he will tell you if he wants to stop, for any reason—<i>any</i> reason at all. Even so, you intend to pay close attention to his reactions, to ask him often whether he is enjoying himself.</p><p>As you kiss him, you draw a hand down his chest, ruffling feathers on your journey to his stomach. He tenses.</p><p>“Is it strange if I touch your feathers?” you ask.</p><p>“A little,” he admits. “I’ve never had feathers before, you see.”</p><p>You smile against his mouth. His sense of humor heartens you. “I can avoid touching your feathers, if you like.”</p><p>“Well, I do have a lot of them, so that might be difficult,” he says, breathily. He hesitates. “And...it doesn’t feel <i>bad</i>...”</p><p>“Does it feel good, though?”</p><p>He gulps audibly, but his answer is still a rasp: “Yes.”</p><p>You decide quickly: you don’t need to avoid his feathers, but you will not seek them out. Even if the touch brings him physical pleasure, it clearly makes him uncomfortable. You straddle him and press your hips gently into his.</p><p>“Is this okay?” you ask.</p><p>“It’s, ah, very enjoyable. Quite lovely, as a matter of fact.”</p><p>You rock your hips against his, moving your mouth along his jaw to the muscle below his ear, biting at it, hard, the way you know he used to like. He makes a noise of pleasure. Your mouth moves down his neck, across his collarbone, down his chest, biting gently. Between your legs, where you are pressing against him, you feel him grow aroused. Watching his face carefully, you lower your hand, separating the feathers to grasp his swelling cock. He throws his head back with a moan, pale neck arching.</p><p>“Does that feel good?”</p><p>“Oh gods, v-very good,” he groans.</p><p>He watches as you move down his body, positioning yourself between his legs.  You take him into your mouth as he swears loudly.</p><p>“Fuck, that feels good. But you...you don’t—aaah—have to...I mean—ah—I c-can’t reciprocate...“</p><p>You pause to look up at him, his body taught with pleasure, face red, lip caught between his teeth.</p><p>“I’m enjoying myself a great deal,” you smirk. “Oh Julian, seeing you like this? It makes me so wet.”</p><p>And it’s true: the feel of him in your mouth and the sounds of his pleasure unlock waves of desire deep inside you. How long has it been? Far too long. You move your mouth up and down his shaft, hand following with a twist.</p><p>“Ah, I, ah, I’m not going to last very long like this,” he chokes out.</p><p>Looking up at him, “That’s alright.”</p><p>“No, ah, no I want to—I want it to last longer.”</p><p>“Alright.” You run one hand across his chest and move the other between your own legs. You’re soaked, already, and you shiver a little as you slide a finger between your folds.</p><p>“Oh, yes, yes,” Julian pants.</p><p>“Do you like watching me?”</p><p>“Yes, yes, yes, I like it very much.”</p><p>You spread your knees wider, giving him a little more of a view, watch his eyes watching you, make a muffled sound of pleasure. </p><p>“I like it when you watch me,” you whisper.</p><p>He’s breathing heavily, panting. You feel pleasure building inside you, and it feels good, but...</p><p>“Julian, I want you inside me. I want to feel you inside me.”</p><p>“Yes, oh, yes I want to feel you....”</p><p>Slowly you straddle him, eliciting a gasp as you take his member in your hand and guide it between you legs. You’re so wet you slide onto him easily. He groans loudly, arching up to meet you. You press down, savoring the feel of his feathered hips against the inside of your thighs.</p><p>“Oh, gods, I-I’m not going to last you feel so <i>good</i> so <i>good</i>...”</p><p>You aren’t even moving yet, enjoying the press of him inside you, amplified by your finger still moving against you. You’d made sure you were close already—he’s told you he’ll be quick.</p><p>Slowly, slowly, you lift yourself then lower yourself again. He wails.</p><p>“It’s so <i>good</i> you feel so <i>good</i>,” he babbles.</p><p>You speed up, pleasure gathering deep in your stomach as you ride him.</p><p>“Julian,, mm, I love how you feel inside me, I love how you look right now, love how you sound...”</p><p>He bucks his hips up against you, and speech leaves you with a gasp of delight.</p><p>“Was that...was that...are you alright?” he asks anxiously.</p><p>“Oh, Julian, that felt amazing,” you purr.</p><p>He smiles. “Alright.”</p><p>You ride through your pleasure together, your hands roaming freely between his body and your own. And then you feel yourself catch, and you’re pushed over the brink, crying out as your release washes over you. When you recover, Julian’s eyes are on you, reverent with lust.</p><p>“Your turn,” you gasp, hitching your hips in a rocking motion that makes him swear.</p><p>You speed up, resuming a regular rhythm, rolling your hips with each thrust. “Tell me how you want it. Faster? Slower?”</p><p>“Like that,” his eyes are shut tight. You keep your pace, unrelenting. “Oh, like, oh—“</p><p>Then his hips buck erratically and he’s shouting, sobbing, filling you... a few final weak thrusts and he stops moving, tension slowly leaving him. He moans your name. You lift yourself off him with shaking legs and reach up to untie him. While you wipe his legs and yours with a rag, he flexes his arms and rubs his wrists.</p><p>“You alright?” you ask.</p><p>He laughs weakly. “My dear, I’m certainly much better than alright.”</p><p>You lie down in the crook of his shoulder, skin pressed against his feathers. He wraps an arm around you, lightly, carefully.</p><p>“Was that- how are you?” he asks, tension in his voice. You smile. Oh Julian, did he see you? Hear you?</p><p>“I am also ‘much better than alright,’” you say teasingly.</p><p>You crane your neck to look up at his face. He is smiling gently, eyes closed, his expression peaceful.</p><p>“Thank you,” you say quietly, your voice small.</p><p>He laughs, really laughs. “My dear, you did most of the work. I had the easy part. Thank <i>you</i>.”</p><p>“I mean, not just this. I mean thank you for...for trying. With this, and with everything. I know I made it harder for you, taking you from...where you were, pushing you.”</p><p>He sighs, closes his eyes, shakes his head. “This...you brought me here, to <i>this</i>. To a life. Whatever I was doing? At the Hanged Raven? That wasn’t life. You’ve brought me back to life.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Feathers and Skin</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>He leans over you, presses you back into the mattress. You clutch his face, his neck, his shoulders, while he strokes your cheek gently with a scaled knuckle, propping himself up on one strong sinewy arm. Your mouth moves ferociously over his, even while, tentatively, your knee presses between his legs. He rubs against it. His mouth moves down to your throat, and the scrape of his inhuman teeth is too sharp...you let out a small cry of pain, and he pulls away quickly. He tries to roll off you but you grab his waist with your hands, firmly.</p><p>“No, please don’t stop,” you beg.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Angst and smut. NSFW. Monsterfucking. I tried to write feelings and it turned into a sex scene...oops?</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>After that night, everything changed.</p><p>....is what you’d be tempted to say, for the sake of narrative. But that’s not how things work. Even the most remarkable earth-shaking single act of love (carnal or otherwise) does not heal a broken soul.</p><p>Your days are still gray, gray as the dull pearl sky above you, but gray can be soothing. You track time by the slow healing of the last of Julian’s wounds from the Hanged Raven. He has gotten better, better than he was, in more ways than physical. There have been a thousand incremental tiny steps, starting before the night when you (re-)consummated your love. Moments when he has made a joke then laughed in surprise at it, moments when he has praised your potato-and-onion soup with poetic gusto, moments when he has flashed you a dazzling smile. You did not fuck him back into the world of the living; you took his hand while he very slowly walked there (and yes of course you fucked along the way).</p><p>Because yes, after that night, you continue to. Fuck, that is. It’s lovely, to see him flushed and overwhelmed with pleasure, to just <i>touch</i> him as much as you want to, without him flinching away in self-consciousness, to see him convinced that he’s giving you something you fiercely desire. And afterward he lets you lie against him, feathers pressed to skin. Sometimes you even fall asleep like that.</p><p>Sleep, though—his sleep is still laced through with nightmares violent enough that he cries out in terror. When you shake him awake you have to remind him he’s with you, that he’s safe (hah). You tell him everything will be alright (you lie). Sometimes he cries and you wipe away his tears with your nightshirt. Sometimes you hold his head in your lap and stroke his feathers until he drifts back to sleep. Sometimes he just stares hollow-eyed into nothing while he clings (lightly, always so carefully) to you. In the morning he thanks you quietly, embarrassed, and apologizes for disturbing your sleep.</p><p> </p><p>Your trips in the forest sometimes last all day now. You realize you’ve been dreading this day as much as you’ve been eagerly awaiting it: he is strong enough for you to continue your journey.</p><p>“I think we should think about leaving, looking for the others,” you say slowly, staring down at your roasted squash stew.</p><p>“You-you think so? You think we’re ready for that? I, ah, suppose we were waiting here for me to recover, after all, and I seem to be on the mend, don’t I? Looking quite well, I am, if what you tell me has any truth to it. But how sure are you? What’s say you do a few more check-ups on me, doc, hm? Make sure I’m really in ship-shape?”</p><p>He rises from his chair and offers you his hand, waggling his feathered eyebrows in his old way, a gesture that makes you grin warmly. But you see what he’s doing.</p><p>“You’re changing the subject,” you persist. “As appealing as the offer is, I want to talk about this now.”</p><p>“You wound me, my dear. Have my charms faded so quickly? We have all the time in the world to talk, and I can think of more, mm, <i>appealing</i> things to do in the moment, can’t you?”</p><p>You cut to the heart of the matter.</p><p>“I know you’re afraid of seeing them again, Julian. But I meant it when I said they’ll want to see you. Portia, Mazelinka, Asra, even Nadia...they all love you. They’re probably wondering where we are, whether...we’re even still alive.”</p><p>His face falls as he slumps back into his chair. “Perhaps it’s better for them to continue their wondering, to hold on to their happy memories of me—well, as happy as memories of me are, anyhow. You’ve been, er, unusually forgiving of my...of me, as you always have been, and I’m not sure I can expect such acceptance from everyone.”</p><p>You shake your head. “No matter what you look like, what you’ve been through, they’ll still love you.”</p><p>“My dear,” he says, voice low and full of pain, “it’s not just what I look like, though yes, that is quite alarming. It’s-it’s this whole world. This is my fault. If I’d...if I’d...my deal with the Devil...”</p><p>“Oh Julian, do you really think this...this everything is your fault? We <i>all</i> fought the Devil, and we <i>all</i> lost.”</p><p>“But I- I’m the one who made the deal with him. That was me. You told me that returning you to your body at that moment made the ritual possible. If I hadn’t—“</p><p>“We have no way of knowing what could’ve been. You did what you thought was best in the moment. We all did. You can’t blame yourself. To be quite honest, it’s a little egotistical to think you’re singlehandedly responsible for all this.”</p><p>“Egotism! Yet another of my many flaws!” He grins.</p><p>You roll your eyes. “Look, blame yourself for everything, if you insist. But I promise you, Portia and Mazelinka want to see you. They’re your family. <i>Our</i> family. I want to find them, and I want you with me when I do.”</p><p>“Then I’ll go. Anything for you, my love.”</p><p>You smile, but it’s bittersweet. He still blames himself, you know, and you can’t convince him otherwise.</p><p>“Thank you, Julian. It’ll be worth it, you’ll see.” You wish you believed that yourself. But for now, you’re here, you’re safe, and you have each other. You reach over and run your fingers up his arm. “Now, you said something about me doing a more...thorough examination?”</p><p>“Mm, indeed, my devoted nurse, I think I require some of your tender ministrations.”</p><p> </p><p>The next day you begin to prepare. From flour sacks, you fashion a pack for him to carry supplies. You gather and dry medicinal herbs from the forest. You sharpen your knives and scissors. The next time Scout returns to visit, you will be ready to leave.</p><p>He wakes sobbing and gasping one night, as he does many nights. You go to him, crawling over the mattress to sit behind his huddled form. He crouches, wings wrapped protectively around his body. You stroke his back gently, fingernails grazing the skin beneath his feathers.</p><p>“Do you want to talk about it?” you ask gently.</p><p>He sobs, “You—there were—they—we can’t leave.”</p><p>“It was a dream, my love.”</p><p>“But-but...” he shakes his head. “It was a dream, but there’s real danger, out there in the world. If we stay here, you’ll be safe.”</p><p>“Safe isn’t the only thing I want to be.” You kiss the back of his neck. “We’re safe here—<i>maybe</i> we’re safe here, we don’t really know that—but when has safety been our only goal in life? If you’d only chosen to be safe, you’d never have found the cure for the plague. You wouldn’t have come back to Vesuvia—<i>we</i> wouldn’t have found each other.”</p><p>“And what good did any of that do?”</p><p>You sigh. Perhaps he has a point. You tried, both of you did, you tried so hard, and what happened? <i>This</i> happened. Maybe you should stop trying. What if you stayed here, safe, together, making what life you could?</p><p>But no: “Don’t you want to know what’s happened to Portia and Mazelinka? Asra and Nadia? What if they need us? What if we can help them? What if we can help <i>someone</i>?”</p><p>“I lost you, twice. I won’t lose you again.”</p><p>“And you won’t lose me. We’ll protect each other.” You take a deep breath. Your voice grows hard. You don’t want to be hard with him, not like this, but you must. “If we stay here? <i>Forever?</i> Then you’ll lose me. If I know I’ve given up on our family, on everyone else in the world? That’s how you’ll lose me. I’ll lose myself. Please, please Julian, don’t make me do that.”</p><p>He turns to look at you, and you feel you’ve been cruel, he looks so anguished. But he kisses you, desperately, hungrily, so that you can taste the anguish in his kiss. He leans over you, presses you back into the mattress. You clutch his face, his neck, his shoulders, while he strokes your cheek gently with a scaled knuckle, propping himself up on one strong sinewy arm. Your mouth moves ferociously over his, even while, tentatively, your knee presses between his legs. He rubs against it. His mouth moves down to your throat, and the scrape of his inhuman teeth is too sharp...you let out a small cry of pain, and he pulls away quickly. He tries to roll off you but you grab his waist with your hands, firmly.</p><p>“No, please don’t stop,” you beg.</p><p>He relaxes slightly. Slowly, you let your hand trail down past his waist. You spread your legs to allow yourself easier access. He holds his breath as you do, exhaling sharply when you grasp the evidence of his arousal, holding it firmly. Again, he moves to roll off of you, but you hold him.</p><p>“I-I like how I feel with you on top of me like this. Is...would you be alright, if we did it like this?”</p><p>“You’re sure?”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“Tell me if anything...doesn’t feel good?”</p><p>“Of course,” you breathe, lifting the hem of your nightshirt and spreading your thighs wider. You’re already wet and aching for him. You reach down and spread yourself to prepare for him.</p><p>He lowers his hips as you guide him to your opening, gasping when he feels you. His eyes search yours carefully as you grasp his hips, pulling him further until he fills you completely.</p><p>After a moment he asks haltingly, “May I—“</p><p>“Yes, yes, please, please,” you gasp, savoring the feel of him but completely unsatisfied by it.</p><p>He starts to move, slowly, and oh, it’s, oh... Every time, before now, he’s lain patiently, carefully inert, stifling his movements while you draw pleasure out of him. He’s been so afraid of hurting you, even as you’ve developed a routine so consistent that you can predict every movement each of you will make, voluntary and involuntary, until you’re both spent and panting, sprawled weakly beside each other on the mattress.</p><p>You’d have him any way you could, of course, but it saddened you a little that the only way he’d let you was as a motionless captive bound beneath you. To watch him moving above you? Your eyes roll back, your throat arching toward him.</p><p>“Are you—“</p><p>“I’m fantastic,” you gasp. “You feel, oh, <i>so</i> good.”</p><p>He moves a little faster, and you whimper your encouragement, “Yes, yes, yes...”</p><p>You lick your fingers and slide them down to touch yourself between your fevered bodies; his hands stay planted on the mattress on either side of your head (he does have <i>talons</i>, after all). He watches you intently, face caught between pleasure and and concern. You shout your encouragement, babbling “yes” and “good” and “oh, Julian” ceaselessly, keeping your eyes on his so he can see your every twinge of pleasure. He’s nervous to do it like this, you know, on top of you, his powerful body the one in control, and you want him to see every flash of delight and desire in your expression.</p><p>“I’m about to come, I’m about to come, I’m about to come,” you babble, your eyes closing involuntarily, neck arching back as your pleasure overtakes you, your chant changing to, “I’m coming, I’m coming, ahhh....”</p><p>He’s still moving slowly when you’ve recovered and can meet his eyes again.</p><p>“Oh gods, Julian, that was amazing.” Your hand trails up to his chest, tracing your wetness up his torso. He shivers. “What do you want now? How do you want to come?”</p><p>He freezes for a moment.</p><p>“I’m really enjoying this,” you say. “I love seeing you—<i>feeling</i> you—over me like this, but if you’d rather do something else...I just want to watch you come.”</p><p>He starts to move again. “Is-is this alright?”</p><p>“Oh, Julian, it’s exquisite.”</p><p>He pumps faster at the encouragement, still watching your face carefully. You reach your hand down to touch yourself again, moaning your encouragement loudly.</p><p>“Oh, gods, I’m going to come again.”</p><p>“Yes, yes, I want you to come again. I want you to—“</p><p>“Oh, I will, I will, I ah—“</p><p>As you feel your waves of tightness squeezing him, you hear a cry escape him, feel him filling you...</p><p>When he rolls off of you, you’re both panting. You reach over to rest a hand on his chest, and he runs a finger up your arm. The two of you fall asleep beside each other, feathers and skin pressed to each other.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Wings</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Of course he’d rather not be the thing he’s become, but part of him has cautiously begun to hope that this new body might be able to accomplish the things he was most proud of in his old body. He struggles to remember events, people, places, yes, but he doesn’t think he has forgotten how to care for the ill or injured. Probably, he can defend you from the monsters that might lurk in this world. You’ve made it very clear (moaned and yelled) that his body brings you pleasure.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>A lot of body-angst (dysmorphia? I think that's the word); Julian has a lot of feelings about his bird body at the beginning. If you don't want to read that part start at the:<br/>******************</p><p>Also some violence in this one (Julian fights something) and some blood, but not too graphic.</p><p>SFW/no smut (sorry)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Julian took it for granted his whole life, feeling comfortable in his body. Aside from the reasonable awkwardness of puberty, he’d never had to think much about it. He ate when he felt hungry, slept when he felt weary, rested when he felt sick or injured; in return, his body gave him the ability to run, laugh, sing, heal, love. As a doctor, of course he knew illness could, and age would, take from him certain abilities, but he had never expected <i>this</i>, to feel himself forced into a physicality completely incongruous with what he thought he was.</p><p>His hatred of this body is tied to his knowledge that it represents his past wrongs. It’s evidence that he wasn’t strong enough, evidence that he failed. Each feather, each claw, is a reminder that he is a failure, that he failed <i>the whole world</i>.</p><p>But somewhere along the way, since you found him, since you pulled him forward out of the Hanged Raven and into his future, he has decided to live in this body, not merely exist while trying to ignore it. You are so consistently, calmly, rational about the choices he made, and the conclusion you draw is to forgive him! Or, to not even blame him in the first place! He is beginning to believe you, that yes, even if he chose wrong he chose as well as he could have in the moment, and in any case, that choice is in the past and there is no use in flagellating himself by relitigating it over and over again. And with this step toward forgiving his actions, he can begin to forgive his body.</p><p>Indeed, it is difficult to hate this body when you praise it so profusely, insist on fussing over it, shout to the heavens the pleasure you derive from it. He has learned that sometimes, he must trust you more than he trusts himself. Sometimes he catches himself preening his feathers with care, even...<i>admiring</i> their iridescence.</p><p>Of course he’d rather not be the thing he’s become, but part of him has cautiously begun to hope that this new body might be able to accomplish the things he was most proud of in his old body. He struggles to remember events, people, places, yes, but he doesn’t think he has forgotten how to care for the ill or injured. Probably, he can defend you from the monsters that might lurk in this world. You’ve made it very clear (moaned and yelled) that his body brings you pleasure.</p><p> </p><p>******************************<br/>It helps, certainly, that he’s no longer in physical pain. His glass-cut feet and wounds from ripped-out feathers have healed, enough that you have left the inn together, following Scout out into the strangeness of the world. You are trudging through a dense, dark forest, dark enough that you have conjured a magelight to see your way. Scout leads you on a path, a narrow trail worn through the crowding vegetation on either side of you. Strange noises emanate from the depths of the woods, calls of unfamiliar birds, occasionally shrieks that sound like death knells.</p><p>So it takes a moment to register the snuffling, snorting noise ahead on the path. Scout sees it first, lets out a cry of alarm, and Julian quickly moves to put himself between you and the potential danger. Then he sees it: a huge boar-like thing, with two sets of tusks, dirty with something that might be dried blood, and sharp spines down its back. Then, it sees him.</p><p>He acts out of instinct more than thought, spreading his wings and puffing out his plumage to make himself as large as possible. It shocks him, a little, his own animalistic reaction, but he has no time to contemplate that because the boar is clearly preparing to charge, pawing the ground and huffing loudly. And then it does, picking up speed as it approaches, and Julian lets out an inhuman shriek, feathers on end, teeth bared, lunging forward. The boar stops short, pauses in its tracks. Julian shrieks again. For a moment he thinks he might have scared it off...but then with renewed vigor it prepares to charge again. Julian doesn’t give it that chance. He races forward to meet it, and his claws rake across its face. The boar lets out a squeal of pain, tosses its head, and Julian strikes again. A tusk connects with his ribs, but it’s a glancing blow, not a stabbing one. It tosses its head again, sharp tusk cutting his leg. He grabs onto a tusk with one hand, swipes at its face again with the other, this time with more leverage. Then the sharp claws of Julian’s foot connect with its throat. The scream it makes is horrific, almost human....</p><p>It is over quickly. The beast lies dead on the forest floor.</p><p>Julian looks down at himself, sticky with blood, much of it his opponent’s. His own sudden violence has shocked him. And you saw it all. All your gentle assurances that he is not a monster, that he is still the same man he was—what will you think now?</p><p>Then you are upon him, hands on his shoulders, saying his name over and over again, and when you step around him to see his bloodied body your expression is predictably horrified. This is it. The moment you finally realize he is a monster.</p><p>“Julian, are you alright? Oh, no, you’re hurt, here, sit down, let me see, oh gods, how bad is it? How much does it hurt? And your leg too!”</p><p>You’re unpacking your medical supplies, and then your hands are on him.</p><p>“I was so afraid,” you’re saying, “oh gods, I thought it was going to-to...and you were so brave! But I should’ve known—you said you were going to protect me. Julian, I think you just saved my life.”</p><p>“I-I suppose I may have done that.”</p><p>“If it had just been Scout and me? I don’t know what we would have done. How do you feel,” you ask, frowning at his injuries.</p><p>“I-I killed it. I didn’t even think about it, I just—I just killed it.”</p><p>“You reacted. It was the only thing you could do. You saved our lives.”</p><p>The boar’s tusks cut his side and leg, but fortunately neither is deep. You clean his wounds, apply ointment, and bandage them. He is babbling about how he killed it so <i>quickly</i>, so <i>easily</i>, like it was nothing...</p><p>“Julian. Look at me. You protected Scout and me. The alternative to what you did was for at least one of us to die.”</p><p>“I did that,” he whispers, glancing at the ruined corpse.</p><p>“Yes, you did. You are capable of doing <i>that</i>, when you need to. But you did it because you <i>had to</i>. You are no more inclined to violence than you used to be—maybe more <i>capable</i> of it, when the situation calls for it...but you did this because you were <i>protecting</i> us, alright?”</p><p>“Alright,” he chokes out, eyes distant.</p><p>“Do you think you can walk? We can rest awhile.”</p><p>“I think I’m fine,” he says quietly.</p><p>You take his hand, bloody as it is, and you follow Scout.</p><p>The forest gradually thins, gives way to marshland, and then—the sea. Even now, in this unknown wilderness, the sight of it brings Julian something that might be joy. </p><p>You pause to give Julian the opportunity to wash the blood from himself; unfortunately there was no easy way to clean it from him in the woods and now it is drying and sticky, but a quick swim takes care of it. As he dries, you preen his feathers, and he finds himself relaxing into your touch, forgetting his distress at the violent encounter. When he is clean and dry, you continue your journey.</p><p>Your small party follows the coastline for a ways, Julian somewhat calmed by the sight of the line where sea meets sky. It reminds him of how small his actions are, compared to the vastness of the world, and that is a comfort to him.</p><p>After...a while (time is fickle in the strangeness of this world) you come to a rockier region of the shore, and Scout makes it clear she will rest a while. You take the opportunity to stretch and flex your bodies in ways that counteract the monotonous motion of walking for so long.</p><p>Julian spreads his wings absently, looking longingly at the horizon.</p><p>“Julian,” you say tentatively, “do you think you can fly?”</p><p>He blushes ferociously, looks away, and for a moment you fear you have ignited his highly flamable furnace of self-doubt</p><p>But then: “Maybe. Perhaps. I do have wings after all, don’t I?”</p><p>“Have...you tried at all?”</p><p>He laughs roughly. “No, I certainly have not.” His wings have been awkward appendages, another piece of his ungainly new body that he must contend with, as his punishment. He doesn’t deserve to enjoy them.</p><p>“I...think you could. Those wings look...substantial. I mean of course you don’t have to try, if you don’t want to.”</p><p>You can’t hide the eagerness in your voice. Julian folds his wings, spreads them again. He catches you watching with awe. Damnit. It would make you so happy if he flew, or at least tried, wouldn’t it?</p><p>“Well...let’s see here...”</p><p>He can control them easily, folding them in or spreading them out, flexing them forward or back, but usually he’s just trying to keep them out of the way. This is the first time he’s tried to <i>use</i> them. He flaps them experimentally. They create a trememdous wind. He glances at you, clothes and hair blown back, eyes shining with anticipation. Again, then—more forceful this time....and his feet leave the ground, hovering for a moment before he thuds down back to earth.</p><p>You’re squealing with delight, “Julian, Julian you <i>flew!</i>”</p><p>He laughs self-consciously. “A bit of an exaggeration to call that flight, my dear.”</p><p>“It was only your first try! Oh, Julian you—“</p><p>But instead of finishing your sentence you rush forward and press your lips to his, grasping his feathered cheeks. And his soul feels light enough that he grasps your waist and kisses you ferociously back.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Vesuvia</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>He doesn’t notice the arrow until it pierces his wing, drawing a shriek of pain from him. You’re shouting at the archers not to shoot, running forward to put your obviously human body between him and their missiles, but before you can reach him another arrow pierces his wing. You spread your arms wide, pushing him behind you as he huddles in pain, and his submissive posture combined with your panicked shouted promises that you come in peace seem enough to stop their volleys, at least for a moment.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This chapter has a bit of a different flavor from the rest and was a bit of a stretch for me—turns out I’m way more comfortable writing smut and feelings than I am writing about actual events happening. However, it felt like the right direction for the story, and if I wait until I’m completely happy with it I’ll never post it.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When the sight of Vesuvia begins to glimmer on the horizon, you can feel the joy and levity draining from Julian like water from a leaky cask. As you followed the coastline, he had been practicing flying, occasionally swimming in the sea, emerging sparkling with spray and the sunlight off his feathers, and you thought things were...good. But now he walks more slowly, encourages you to stop more often to rest, and you think you know exactly what this is about.</p><p>“They‘ll want to see you, love,” you reassure him. “They love you. They’re probably worried about us, right now, and they’ll be so happy to see you again, to know you’re safe.”</p><p>“Perhaps, ah, perhaps <i>you</i> can find them, just you alone, without me there to bother everyone, and let them know that I’m fine, and that will be that—no one has to worry about me, and no one has to, er, put up with me.”</p><p>“You know that won’t work. What? You just live in a hut in the woods and I take messages back and forth to Portia and Mazelinka and never explain why you won’t interact with them?”</p><p>“Perfect. A lovely idea.” He grins weakly.</p><p>You lace your fingers with his. “I’ll be with you the whole time. I’m here, by your side, and I’m not going anywhere.”</p><p> </p><p>Once you could see Vesuvia on the horizon and she pointed you on the relatively straight pathway there, Scout made it clear she had her own business to attend to and bade you farewell. Now it’s just you and Julian, making your way through this increasingly strange world. It had been relatively easy going, but it seems as you approach Vesuvia—which shimmers and shifts strangely—your surroundings grow...weirder. As you wade through the shallowest parts of the wide salt marsh surrounding the city, giant leeches as long as your leg rear up out of the mud. Julian dispatches them with a swift slash of his claws, which have grown sharp again since your trimming and filing back at the inn. Once, tentacles as tall as you reach out from the deeper pools of the marsh, one wrapping firmly around your arm. Julian shreds them to ribbons with a fierce shriek, no longer timid about exercising his ferocity in your defense. He flies up and dives down onto the back of a giant crab, the size of a large man, cracking its carapace with the weight of his feet before it can reach you with one of its too-many pincers.</p><p>By the time you reach the city walls, you are both covered in sprays of red, blue, and black blood, drying sticky and stiff on feathers and clothing, only a very little of it your own. You initially tried to wash it off in the salty waters of the marsh, but at some point you mostly gave up, since it seemed as soon as you got clean something else was trying to eat you. Speed became a priority over cleanliness. So when you’re finally making your way up the grassy slopes to the city gates, you’re a sight to behold.</p><p>The people of Vesuvia, however, don’t notice you at first, occupied as they are with the massive lizard scaling the lemonstone walls. Arrows are glancing off its scales. The people on the top of the wall are trying to fend it off with pikes as it reaches the walkway. You hear a scream as it sinks its teeth into one of them.</p><p>“Well, my dear, wish me luck,” Julian says briskly as he launches himself into the air.</p><p>Your heart is in your throat as you see archers notice him, shouting and taking aim.</p><p>“I’m here to help!” Julian shouts. “I’ll help you fight this big ugly lizard!”</p><p>His voice is loud, and it’s enough to give pause to the archers. It’s also enough to get the attention of the lizard, which turns its head to look at him.</p><p>“That’s right, you old so-and-so, there’s another monster here now,” he snarls.</p><p>As he flies closer, the beast takes a swipe at him, twisting in such a way that it lifts its underbelly from the wall. One of the pike-wielders takes the opportunity to hit the soft skin where its front leg connects to its body. The lizard roars in pain, turning away from Julian. He takes the opportunity to fly close, raking its side with the sharp talons of his feet. Attacked from both front and back now, the lizard is distracted, attention divided. Julian swerves around to attack it from one side, then the other, shining like a dark jewel. Trying to avoid the pike-wielders and trying to swipe at Julian first on the right, then the left, the lizard releases both front claws from the wall, overbalances, and falls the considerable distance to the earth, rolling a ways down the slope.</p><p>Julian rushes toward it and finishes it off with a slash across the throat.</p><p>He doesn’t notice the arrow until it pierces his wing, drawing a shriek of pain from him. You’re shouting at the archers not to shoot, running forward to put your obviously human body between him and their missiles, but before you can reach him another arrow pierces his wing. You spread your arms wide, pushing him behind you as he huddles in pain, and his submissive posture combined with your panicked shouted promises that you come in peace seem enough to stop their volleys, at least for a moment. Just in case, you drag him around the lizard corpse, huddling behind it.</p><p>“Who goes there?” demands a voice from the top of the wall. “State your names and your business with Vesuvia.”</p><p>You shout back your name and Julian’s. “We seek Countess Nadia Satrinava and her head servant, Portia Devorak. This is her brother, Doctor Julian Devorak.”</p><p>You figure those are the names they’re most likely to recognize, and if Nadia still has any power in this city, she can guarantee your safety.</p><p>There seems to be a discussion happening among the wall guards. It occurs to you that even if you are human, you are a stranger, and might be viewed as a danger as well.</p><p>You continue shouting, “If you won’t bring Portia Devorak or the Countess to prove we’re trustworthy then we will leave.”</p><p>“Too late for that!” someone shouts back. “We won’t have dangerous strangers slinking about around our gates!”</p><p>So you’re stuck. You turn to Julian. He’s curled in on himself, wing half-folded. Whatever the guards decide, you need to help him with his wounds.</p><p>The arrows have pierced through the wing, still embedded.</p><p>“You have to break off the heads and pull them out,” he says weakly.</p><p>First you get bandages and clean water from your pack. He braces himself, crying out in pain as you break the first arrow in half, then shrieking as you yank it back through the wing in one clean motion. Quickly you press bandages to both sides of the wound, gathering your magic into your hands, willing the bleeding to slow. Once it seems stabilized, you repeat the process with the other arrow. You clean the wound a bit (unfortunately all you have left is water) and wrap the wing with bandages.</p><p>Julian is shrunken, defeated, and you know it isn’t just from the pain.</p><p>“I’m sorry for bringing you here,” you say.</p><p>He shakes his head. “I am a monster.”</p><p>“No, no you’re not. You just saved those people from this giant lizard.” You gesture to the corpse behind you. “If they had any sense they’d be thanking you.”</p><p>You’re trying to think of what else you can say to convince the guards you’re not a danger when you hear the clang of gates.</p><p>“Well, something’s happening, anyway,” you mutter.</p><p>You hear voices approaching, then one voice, loud and authoritative, carries above the others...and it sounds...familiar...</p><p>“...pretending to be my brother why on earth would he make himself look like a demon?”</p><p>A quieter voice says something.</p><p>“Did they hurt anyone, Antonia? No? Then I’m confident I can handle them. Hey! You there! Show yourselves!”</p><p>The voice is quite close now. You and Julian exchange a look, then, cautiously, slowly, you turn and raise your head above the lizard’s side.</p><p>Portia Devorak’s eyes go wide at the sight of your face. She’s dressed in leather armor, her hair braided tightly back, but you recognize her instantly. She shouts your name as she strides toward you with a look of wonder, stepping around the massive dead lizard. When she does, she sees Julian. She freezes. He shrinks in to himself.</p><p>No one moves for a moment.</p><p>“Ilya?”</p><p>He nods.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” he begins to babble. “I’m so sorry Pasha, I never should have come here, I’m sorry for-for coming to your city, I should’ve known no one would want to see me—“</p><p>She cuts him off by wrapping her arms around him. He looks stunned.</p><p>“Oh, Ilya!” Her tears are flowing now. “What happened to you? But you came! You came here and found me and oh! Oh no, you’re hurt! Did the lizard do that? Or—“</p><p>Her face darkens.</p><p>“Antonia,” she shouts over the dead lizard, “find out who shot my brother and see that they never wield a weapon again.”</p><p>Julian looks at her wide eyed.</p><p>“Don’t hurt them or anything, Antonia,” she adds. “Just take away their weapons privileges.”</p><p>“Yes milady,” someone shouts in reply.</p><p>“‘Milady’?” you ask.</p><p>Portia winces in embarrassment. “I took on sort of a leadership role after...it doesn’t matter. Let’s get you inside the city.” She glances around. “When there’s one giant venomous lizard there’s usually another.”</p><p>“Venomous?” you ask as you help a still-stunned Julian to his feet.</p><p>“Oh, highly. And thanks to my useless militia” —she shouts that part up to the ramparts— “that shoots first and asks questions later, we’ve just lost our best defense against them.”</p><p>Portia grips Julian’s hand as you help him through the city gates. Eyes are upon him, many hostile, but you wrap your arm around his waist, holding him tightly, and Portia clings to his other side. When you look at his face, his expression is grim, but he keeps walking forward.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>1. I might go back and edit some stuff to make it clear Julian’s dick, like those of the birds with dicks, kind of retracts into his body and it’s not just hanging out in front of everyone and his sister. <br/>2. With only a few sentences, I have created Post-Apocalyptic Portia, but I am already a Big Fan.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Reunions</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Word spreads like wildfire of the winged monster that defeated a <i>giant venomous lizard</i>, a monster with a human... <i>companion</i> that Portia Devorak escorted through the city, a monster she and Nadia Satrinava now harbor <i>in their home</i>. </p><p>You hear Portia and Nadia’s whispered arguments in the other room when they think you’re sleeping. Julian hears them too. You can’t stay here. The survivors of Vesuvia have made it this far by protecting each other from outside threats and being highly suspicious of the strange.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The first time he returned to Vesuvia, Julian was a man wanted for murder but beloved by the people of the city. The second time he returns, both he and Vesuvia have been twisted and hardened by the work of the Devil, and perhaps the people of the city simply have less love in their hearts to give.</p><p>You and Portia crowd against his sides as the three of you make your way up the main street beyond the gate. By the glares of anger and the gasps of fear you receive, you think that you and, more importantly, Portia, may be the only reason he survives the trek to the house where Portia and Nadia have been living. The palace, as the epicenter of Lucio’s attempted ritual, is the most adversely affected part of Vesuvia, and Portia explains that no one has inhabited it since that night.</p><p>Portia guides you to the bedroom—hers and Nadia’s, she tells you with a blush—but as you try to lay Julian down on the bed he protests.</p><p>“I’m splattered with at least four different kinds of blood,” he cries. “I’m-I’m far too filthy for your lovely clean bed, Pasha. Five kinds of blood if you count my own.”</p><p>Portia rolls her eyes. “We wash the sheets, you know. But if you want a bath, I can arrange that.”</p><p>Apparently the aqueducts are still working, and a few magical carvings heat the water. You help Julian into the human-sized tub (he has to fold his legs up to fit into it).</p><p>“I’ll send word to Mazelinka,” Portia says, clutching Julian’s hand, fresh tears pooling in her eyes. “She’ll help with your wounds and, oh, Ilya, she’ll be so happy to see you.”</p><p>“You and Nadia, eh?” he replies, grinning through gritted teeth. He waggles his feathered eybrows weakly. “Good for you, baby sister. A <i>countess?</i> And a gorgeous one, at that.” He turns quickly to you, still waggling his eyebrows. “Though not as gorgeous as the one I’ve snagged.”</p><p>“Oh Ilya, don’t be <i>crude</i>.”</p><p>Portia swats his arm lightly, but like you she’s grinning at his teasing, a display of his old self, the one you’d both feared was lost. She places a quick kiss on his cheek, then hurries out the door.</p><p>“I’d ah, invite you in, my dear, but I’m afraid I don’t seem to leave much room.”</p><p>“Just let me take care of you.”</p><p>He smiles sheepishly. “Alright.”</p><p>First you check his wing, half-folded, hanging over the edge of the tub. When you’re satisfied the wounds haven’t started bleeding again, you wash the grime from his feathers carefully. He watches you adoringly, even though his expression is still tight with pain. You dry him off and help him to the bed, then return to the bathroom to bathe yourself. When you are dry and dressed in your spare set of clothes (you think Portia and Nadia will forgive you for leaving your filthy clothes in their bathroom for now; you will wash them later) you return to Julian’s side.</p><p>His face is fixed in a grimace and sweat is beading on his brow.</p><p>“Let me see your wing again,” you command gently.</p><p>He groans, leaving his wing half-folded. “It’s fine. Just leave it be.”</p><p>“I want to see it.”</p><p>“I’m a doctor. I’d know if I needed something. Just—I—I just need you.”</p><p>His eyes are so filled with want that you immediately lie down on the bed beside him. He raises his hand as though he wants to touch you, but is afraid to. You grasp it and bring it to your cheek, and he flinches as you do, though he doesn’t try to pull away.</p><p>“I love you, Julian,” you sigh.</p><p>“I love you too,” he says, but you can hear that there’s something else, some words on his tongue he hesitates to say.</p><p>“Tell me what’s on your mind,” you ask.</p><p>He takes a deep breath. “Those people in the city. I saw how they looked at me. I saw their fear, their revulsion, their...<i>hatred</i>. If we stay here for any amount of time, and if you stay with me, they’ll look at you that way, too. I don’t expect you to endure that, to endure their scorn and hatred.”</p><p>“If they hate me for loving you, they are fools, and I do not care what they think.”</p><p>He smiles weakly. “That’s easy for you to say now, but think of the rest of your life. Think of living for the rest of your days, <i>hated</i> by everyone. Or, alone, away from everyone else to avoid their fear and scorn.”</p><p>“Not everyone. Portia loves both of us. Mazelinka, Asra, and Nadia have long cared for us. We both have friends here, in Vesuvia, and we can find them.”</p><p>He closes his eyes and shakes his head weakly. “You could live an ordinary life. A life with as many friends, <i>human</i> friends, as many <i>human</i> lovers—“</p><p>“No, Julian. I want you. If <i>either</i> of us ever wants for other lovers, we’ll discuss that, but I love you. I want to <i>be with</i> you, physically yes but more than that. Until you tell me you no longer love me, I will not leave you.”</p><p>He draws a deep breath.</p><p>You tell him, “I love you and want you very much. That’s the thing that’s most true for me, now.”</p><p>You stroke his brow, and some of the lines of worry fade from his face. He’s been lying on his right side, his wounded left wing spread out behind him, but he rolls onto his back, arranging his right wing beneath him and his left wing gingerly beside him. He sighs. He looks so perfect and so sad, lying there, eyes closed, that you can’t help but lean over and kiss him. He kisses you back, stroking your hair and your back for a while, but when you move to straddle him he freezes.</p><p>“Not in Pasha’s bed!” he squawks.</p><p>You laugh and roll off him.</p><p>“Fair enough,” you say. Then you lean over to whisper in his ear, voice low and sultry, “But take this as my solemn promise that I plan to”—you glance at his wing—“<i>very gently</i> ravish you, the first chance we get.”</p><p> </p><p>You realize you’ve both fallen asleep when Mazelinka’s arrival wakes you.</p><p>“Ilya?” She’s a tough woman, but her eyes fill with tears when she sees him.</p><p>He rolls on his side to greet her, then cries out in pain when he lands on his injured wing. You pull him gently to return to his back, rubbing his shoulder.</p><p>“Ilyushka, I thought you were dead,” she sobs, rushing to his side and unpacking her bag of medicines.</p><p>“Well, I’m not quite,” he says through gritted teeth. “Though I may have deserved it, a few—OW!”</p><p>He makes a sound of pain as she unwraps the bandages.</p><p>“Who did this? The healing work. You?” she asks, glancing at you.</p><p>You nod sheepishly.</p><p>“It’s good work.” She nods. Then she glances at Julian, expression less charitable, eyes still filled with tears. “You’ll live, you silly boy.”</p><p>He protests his epithet of “silly boy” as she pulls herbs and ointments from her bag.</p><p>“Hold these feathers out of the way?”</p><p>You immediately scramble to your feet to oblige.</p><p>“I’ve never treated a patient with wings or feathers,” she notes mildly, wiping at his skin with an herbal ointment that makes him swear.</p><p>“Shhh,” you reassure him, stroking his brow with your free hand.</p><p>Mazelinka wipes away her own tears roughly as she works. You see her swallow hard, eyes shiny.</p><p>“Can I help any more, Mazelinka?” you ask, hesitantly.</p><p>She looks up at you, grateful.</p><p>“Bandage that one, then we’ll move on to the next,” she chokes.</p><p>While you wrap one of her clean bandages around Julian’s wing, she reaches up to cup his face with her hands.</p><p>“Ilya, I thought I’d never see you again.”</p><p>“Well, you certainly never thought you’d see me like <i>this</i>.”</p><p>“Tsk, I changed your diapers, Ilyushka. I’ve seen you enough ways you can’t shock me.”</p><p>Amidst his sounds of indignation, Mazelinka moves to dress the second wound in his wing. She nods approvingly, glancing at you.</p><p>“You’ve done good work here. We can use a healer like you in the city.”</p><p>“Oh, I-I’m not really a healer—“</p><p>“You’ll be one now. We need all the help we can get. Hand me that,” she indicates a jar next to her bag, and you oblige.</p><p>So Mazelinka does what she can for Julian’s arrow wounds, with your help, while Portia crashes around the city ensuring discipline for the individual or individuals who dared inflict harm on her brother, even if he looks like a demon (she didn’t tell you she was doing this, but you know it’s true).</p><p>When Mazelinka has done all she can and Julian is resting comfortably, she leaves you with instructions for his continued care, plants a kiss on his feathered forehead, and reassures you she’ll be back to check on him.</p><p>“Take good care of our slippery, feathery boy,” she says to you with a toothy grin.</p><p>Julian grins and assures her that you always do.</p><p> </p><p>When Nadia and Portia return home, Asra is with them, Malak flying after him. This is when you break down weeping. It’s been so long, and you’ve been so worried. To be all together, and with the one who brought you back to life...you can’t remember the last time you were this happy. Julian is self-conscious at first, but you beam as you watch him relax into the love that surrounds him. Malak sits on his shoulder, preening his feathers and making pleased little noises. Tears flow. Time is malleable here, so you’re not sure how long you sit together, weeping and laughing and embracing each other. Eventually you need to rest—Portia and Nadia insist you take their bed—and you catch Julian smiling contentedly as he drifts off to sleep beside you.</p><p>Your bliss is not to last. Word spreads like wildfire of the winged monster that defeated a <i>giant venomous lizard</i>, a monster with a human... <i>companion</i> that Portia Devorak escorted through the city, a monster she and Nadia Satrinava now harbor <i>in their home</i>. </p><p>You hear Portia and Nadia’s whispered arguments in the other room when they think you’re sleeping. Julian hears them too. You can’t stay here. The survivors of Vesuvia have made it this far by protecting each other from outside threats and being highly suspicious of the strange.</p><p>There is one place in the city no one goes, one place the people might not mind you staying. The palace is a shifting, shattered, incomprehensible wreck.</p><p>And it hurts you, like cutting out part of your body, to agree with Julian that it’s best not to live among the people of the city. You have spent so long whispering in his ear each night that he is not a monster, that he deserves love, not fear, and now you must agree that he is feared enough that he is in danger here. Portia, Nadia, and Asra are all with you as you walk across the city to the palace. Malak flies overhead. It’s not goodbye, not really—they can visit you whenever they have the time, amidst duties of the City Council (Nadia and Portia) and caring for the orphans of the city (Asra and Muriel—Muriel! You forgot about Muriel!). But it is a surrender. You all know that Julian is being exiled.</p><p>When you and Julian cross the palace gates, the world goes sideways. You barely keep your footing as the path shifts beneath your feet. Your heart goes sideways, too: this strange place, this place where you will stay, feels too much like the Hanged Raven. Have you come this far, only to return to where you found Julian, alone, abandoned, trapped in the Devil’s realm?</p>
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<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Vesuvia's Monster</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>You go to stay with Asra and Muriel, helping them care for the city’s orphans. Asra comforts you when you fall into despair. You hear the people in the city speak of the monster in the tower, and it feels like they are plunging a knife into your body.</p><p>You keep returning to the palace. You give up on pleading, cajoling, shouting. You walk or sit in the swirling shifting shattered garden and watch him. You know he can see you, even it he refuses to acknowledge you.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>At the palace, Julian retreats from you. He begins to rip out his feathers again. When you reach for him, he shrinks from your touch with a hiss—the sound of a beast, not a man. He flies to a high balcony, one for which the stairs have disappeared, and he huddles there, beyond your reach.</p><p>Portia visits. Mazelinka visits. They shout at him. They plead with him. Nothing changes.</p><p>You go to stay with Asra and Muriel, helping them care for the city’s orphans. Asra comforts you when you fall into despair. You hear the people in the city speak of the monster in the tower, and it feels like they are plunging a knife into your body.</p><p>You keep returning to the palace. You give up on pleading, cajoling, shouting. You walk or sit in the swirling shifting shattered garden and watch him. You know he can see you, even it he refuses to acknowledge you.</p><p>You’re walking in the gardens when you see him launch into the sky from his perch. He spirals downward to land, crouching before you, out of your reach, but close enough that you hear him say, “I’m sorry.”</p><p>You stare at him for a long moment, unsure of what to say. He glances up at you but quickly returns his gaze to the ground.</p><p>“I forgive you,” you say. “I’ll forgive you when you stop doing this.”</p><p>He glances up at you again, then looks away as he nods. You take a step towards him, and he makes no move away, so you take another step.</p><p>“You have to know it hurts us, to see you doing this to yourself. Please let us help you.” You keep walking toward him, until you are close enough to touch him. “Let us love you. Let <i>me</i> love you.”</p><p>He flinches when you take his hand, but he does not move away.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” he repeats. He looks pointedly away from you. “I-I don’t know how to tell you how sorry I am. I don’t know how to-to make it up to you.”</p><p>You squeeze his hand. “Stop doing this to yourself. That’s how you make it up to us.”</p><p>He nods and swallows. “I-I don’t know what came over me.”</p><p>“The people of the city exiled you here. I can’t imagine how hard that was—is. You’re allowed to be sad and angry about that. But there are still those of us who love you. Let us be near you while you’re sad and angry.”</p><p>“Will you—will you tell them I’m sorry?”</p><p>“I’ll bring them here so you can tell them yourself.”</p><p> </p><p>Of course Portia weeps profusely, berates him lovingly, twists his ear. “Don’t you do that to me again!”</p><p>Mazelinka brings ointment for the ragged patches where he has torn out his feathers and scratched himself, tutting at him gently.</p><p>Asra embraces him warmly. “I knew you’d come back to us, Ilya.”</p><p>Even Nadia’s even demeanor cracks when she tells him, “Don’t scare us like that again.”</p><p>You return to stay at the palace with him.</p><p>You go out into the city to use your healing magic where you can, and you hear people beginning to appreciate how useful it is to have him around. When monsters or warlords attack the gate, he helps the guards fight or frighten them off, and it is useful to have an ally who can fly, with sharp talons and teeth and a blood-chilling shriek. The longer he stays, hurting no one but the city’s enemies, the more the rumors begin to take on a note of pride. He is a monster, yes, but he is <i>Vesuvia’s</i> monster. When you return to the palace, occasionally you find things left by the gate: a loaf of bread, a basket of fruit, a cask of ale (you find it amusing that someone has guessed, correctly, that a bird-monster might enjoy ale).</p><p>At first Julian refuses to believe you, when you tell him these things that you hear in the market.</p><p>“Don’t tell me stories to soothe my ego. I can suffer the truth.”</p><p>You show him the gifts left for him.</p><p>He scoffs. “These are offerings to sate a monster. Bribes so that I’ll leave them be.”</p><p>You’ve long ago given up arguing with him when he insists on self-deprecation, but you keep telling him the things you hear, and the gifts keep arriving, and you notice he grows less dismissive.  </p><p>He tells you wonderingly how the guards at the gate cheer for him when he fights off a pack of vicious many-armed monkeys. You both suspect the people of the city might not enjoy him wandering their streets freely, but he knows he is no longer an object of mass hatred, and that means a great deal.</p><p>When he returns from defending the city, you dress his wounds, help him wash the grime away, preen his feathers so they gleam. In the gardens, you wrap his arms around you as you sit together, watching the trees pop in and out of existence. You make love to him, on the cool grass or on the silk sheets of palace beds (when the bedrooms decide to exist). You love him, and he loves you.</p><p>And when he doubts himself, when he needs to fly to the highest balcony and huddle into himself for a time, you let him, because has learned not to stay there alone too long. He always comes back to you.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>This is the longest piece of fiction I’ve ever written! Thank you so much to everyone who read it, left kudos, or commented. It means a lot to know people enjoy my writing, and it’s encouraged me to keep at it!</p>
        </blockquote><div class="children module" id="children">
  <b class="heading">Works inspired by this one:</b>
  <ul>
    <li>
        <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27015604">And For My Next Trick...</a> by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuperImposed/pseuds/Elkian">Elkian (SuperImposed)</a>
    </li>
  </ul>
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